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2014 Street Glide Suspension Upgrade

Never been happy with my 2014 Street Glide "Touring " suspension ,it was pretty disappointing really. I test rode a special in July of 14 , bought mine in Dec 14 and my memory sure recalled a much better ride. Well it was a special that I test rode , I bought the FLHX so after 60 miles I found a set of take -off premium ride adj shocks to swap out the OEM air shocks , and that certainly made a difference ,but the front is just as bad IMO, just harsh is how I would describe it.

Well I decided to finally get a hold of Howard at Motorcycle metal for an upgrade. Howard is an authorized Ohlin service center , he builds custom suspensions including building his own custom triple tree's for Harley's.

I went with Ohlin HD039's for the rear , these come as HD039's then Howard re-valves them to your specs ( weight , riding style , 1 up , 2up , ect ) so they will perform better than any off the self HD039's . There his #2-#2-A's on his site . He offers the whole Ohlin line of shocks for Harleys , customized to your needs.

In the front I had originally wanted the Ohlin FKC102 cartridges , Howard talked me into his new 25mm adjustable cartridges that he's building to order. He sources the parts and custom builds each set , he's telling me these are better than the Ohlins plus there adjustable. I've been waiting 5 weeks for them and the package finally arrived today so along with new brake pads , head bridges , plugs , and OEM fork rebuild kits I'm ready to get at it .

Yesterday ( 4 -12 -18 ) I was able to get out for about a 60mile ride after work , the only good day of the week, weather wise.

Keep in mind I still have the HD adj premium ride shocks on the rear. Bumps haven't vanished but they are defiantly less pronounced , the rear used to be the better riding end of the bike , now it's inadequacies stand out .

Just cruising on the highway it holds a line with ease , smoother but I have some dialing in to do , I think it can be even more to my liking.

Corners and curves are where I really noticed a change, it stays planted , I've scrapped boards / kick stand more in my short ride yesterday than I used to all day long , it used to feel like it was being pushed through a curve or corner, now I'm surprised just how fast I'm going with zero effort, I'm confident it can perform well past my skill set.

I have room for adjustments but I'm going to wait till the rear shocks are on before tweaking anything , the weather has went back to pre-spring here for the next few days so I plan on mounting the shocks this weekend and see what I really have.

(4 - 22- 18 ) I went with ,#2 #2 A's, finally got to test ride about 70 miles with them , think I need to recheck my sag , it's rougher than I anticipated but it was the maiden voyage , looks of potential tweeking to do yet, plus Ohlins need to be broke in 500 - 1000 miles.

I posted on another thread earlier today. I installed the #2-2B about 600 miles ago. Made another adjustment and have a bit more travel now. I decided to go with the 13" instead of the stock 12" Don't feel any difference in height but I would think that extra inch of travel helps. Haven't experienced any bottoming out like with the stock shocks.

Good Infornation. As a lighter weight rider on a 2016 SGS the stock shocks were a horrible ride. I switched to some Drags Specialty rear shocks and they were better than stock. I still wasn’t convinced the ride could be as good as it could be. I came across some CVO touring shocks off an Ultra Classic. This was the ride I was looking for. Way Happy Rider these days.